I don’t know Specialist Suspect, but I’ve met him before. Suspect is the specialist that haunts my dreams. He is the one who cracks jokes in formation, shams to get out of duty and is the reason you always find yourself in front of the commander explaining why the lieutenant is so pissed off.

Suspect is a nightmare because he was good enough to reach the rank of specialist and smart enough to stay there. He’s figured out the system and he works it.Detail to do?He’ll grab a private to do it.

Need him to draw an expensive piece of equipment?

He’ll get his team leader.

Found “Two Girls One Cup” as your default webpage?

“SUSPECT!!!”

Yet somehow, Specialist Suspect always endears himself to you. You find yourself screaming at him, smoking him, and then walking away laughing. There are times when you don’t know whether to kiss him or kill him. If you are training, running patrols or blowing stuff up, he'll be the first one in line and you will be amazed at his performance. But if a truck needs to be moved, he will disappear. You will wish you had ten Suspects out in the field, but one Suspect in the rear is too much.

I started reading Suspect’s blog sometime in October of last year. He was featured on The Sandbox, a website that I started reading out of morbid curiosity when I found out that I was deploying to Iraq.

I’ve found that many milblogs are full of posing and preening. They use deep thoughts and beautiful, surreal colors to describe the sense of determination and wonder that soldiers want the world to think that they feel.

Suspect’s blog was different. First of all, he didn’t care what you thought of him. While other bloggers talked about the beauty of an Iraqi sunset, Suspect would be talking about masturbating in the porta-shitter. Secondly, he wasn’t afraid to show the world that he was only in this for the college money and definitely NOT having a good time.Suspect’s attitude is real. I would say that 80% to 90% of all soldiers are only in it for the college money. They only intend to do one tour. They bide their time shamming, play practical jokes, get drunk and lose their wallet at some fat girl’s house off post and come back to the barracks a vomit-soaked mess. Suspect’s Army is the real Army. His blog opened a window for the world to see Joe through the eyes of Joe.

Suspect is in Kuwait now, waiting to redeploy. As much as I’ll miss the stories he posted every few days, I start my own rotation in mid June and I’ll have my own stories to tell.Welcome back, Suspect. You made it. Now I need you to get a detail together to…SSG Big Tobacco

Not bad huh? He's about to hit the box, so put that link in your favorite's list and keep checking in on him. Hell, that post was so motivating that I kind of want to rip apart a huge steak, swallow some potatoes whole, and suck down a cigar, maybe even slap a General when I'm done.

Great cover jacket. Wonder if the picture on the front will be the cool one of you smokin' after the building went up... or do you have some sick sadistic or perverted picture you're saving? Is it true you dumped the "combat jack" post? Personally I think that was your "crowning moment!" Everybody who I showed that to walked away gagging and laughing. That should be your teaser page...

"...he wasn’t afraid to show the world that he was only in this for the college money and definitely NOT having a good time..."

There's a little something nibbling around the edges of my petrified grey cells telling me there was a post where you most emphatically said you were not there for the college money but for the guys doing the stand-up thing ....

Has it occurred to anybody else- Aunt Sandy - that "Combat Jack" might make a catchy title?!?

I'd seriously consider un-retiring just for the fun of marketing it! :)

As for the cover art, I'm always gonna think of you as that soldier at the top of your page and tho I can't see anything in his hand I've always imagined a cigarette there.

Ricky Nelson .. loved by teenage girls of the late 50's/early 60's not for his voice but for those bedroom eyes and those kissable lips *sigh*

I'm guessing you won't like him as much as I like Weezer but the words sure work.

Here's hoping you're just a wake-up away from the last leg of your trek to Ft Lewis!

a) I never got to read the "combat jack" post, because yes you did dump it. So, please put it in the book.b) Combat Jack might work as a title, I think that deserves some pondering. I think we can come up with something betterc) I think SSg Big Tobacco has a real case on you...you are just the sweetest gall-darn thing! Options:KISS you or KILL you...hmmmm....let me think on that one for a while too.

All kidding aside, what big-tobacco said is why I first started reading your blog when I found "The Downward Spiral" on the Sandbox...You "opened a window for the world to see Joe, through the eyes of Joe." When I read "The Downward Spiral" I remember saying to myself, "Yes, thank God there is a soldier out there keepin' it real and actually letting us see, hear, taste and smell what the hell is really going on in Iraq. But, best of all, Specialist Suspect, you opened a window to your soul, and what a beautiful soul it turned out to be!

I LOVE IT! Anyone who has followed you through deployment knows this was written with all due respect. I believe I began following you when you first reported your experience while delivering the vehicles to the Port of Tacoma. Wow, that was so long ago.

The excitement is in the air here in Washington as the 4/2 begins your long trek home. I'm hearing it on the radio, reading it in the papers. Even though I know it will happen over the next few weeks, you must be real close. My hope is that you feel the joy to the extent that all those who are waiting feel as you march into the gym. The numerous homecomings I have attended were all short and sweet (once the soldiers arrived), but they are etched in my heart forever.

How To Condemn Your Soul

Episode II

This is a continuation of the blog originally hosted at eleven-bravo.blogspot.com. Through a twist of fate, I was not given the MOS 11B, instead I became an 11C. Calling a blog eleven-bravo when I'm 11C is moot.

The old blog contains the first phase of my brief army career. This is the second, the deployment.

It is also crap.

Cover Your Ass

You can't trust everything you read or take it all for face value. NO ONE has the entire view of the Iraq war. There are millions of pieces of the puzzle, perspectives from all sides and it can never be fully understood. This perspective comes from me, a young, uneducated, barely-passable Infantryman. This isn't the news. It's just a look through another set of eyes, nothing more.

Details are omitted to protect OPSEC. Here's a stolen disclaimer.

This website is privately operated and was designed to provide personal information, views and commentary about the authors experiences in Iraq and elsewhere. The images depicted and opinions expressed on this website are solely those of the author and contributors and not those of any agency of the United States Government, expressly including, but not limited to, the Department of Defense, the United States Army, or the United States Army Reserve. The site is not designed, authorized, sanctioned, or affiliated, by or with, any agency of the United States Government, expressly including, but not limited to, the Department of Defense, the United States Army, or the United States Army Reserve. Users and abusers accept and agree to this disclaimer in the use of any information accessed in this website.